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This is Later with Lee Matthews the
Lee Matthews Podcast More what You Hear Weekday

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Afternoon's on the Drive. Frank fick
Lucy was an Assistant director for counter Intelligence

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at the FBI, where he served
twenty five years as a special agent and

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directed all espionage investigations across the government. He's also written the national bestseller The

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FBI Way Inside the Bureau's Code of
Excellence. His newest creation is long Haul

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Hunting the Highway Serial Killers and Frank
Figliuzy, good to have you along here

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today. Oh, it's my pleasure. And boy does Oklahoma play an essential

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part in this book. I imagine
we do as we kind of are the

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crossroads of the entire nation when it
comes to long haul truck or traffic.

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Yeah, it's true, but many
cities are intersections of several interstate highways.

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But you guys are special because the
whole FBI Highway Serial Killings initiative was birthed

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in Oklahoma because of a hero in
my book by the name of Terry Turner

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with the Oklahoma State Bureau of Investigation. So it wasn't the FBI who really

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came up with this idea. They
were dragged into it by Terry Turner,

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who was kind of figuratively pounding her
fist on the desk years ago, back

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in two thousand and three, when
she said, we've got ten young ladies

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missing from Oklahoma who are turned up
dead in other states. I believe they're

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trafficking victims. I believe long haul
truckers have done this. The FBI showed

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up, said you're absolutely right,
and started this initiative long Haul Hunting the

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Highway serial Killers, and Frankfiglusia is
with us. So this was the perfect

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crime for a long haul trucker,
wasn't it. You're always on the go,

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you're kind of in the shadows anyway, you work a lot of odd

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hours at night, and you move
stealthily through the United States. You know,

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there's a reason why long haul trucking
is the number one profession of serial

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killers. It's because of what you
just said. You've got a mobile crime

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scene in an eighteen wheeler, and
these truckers are grabbing their victim in one

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jurisdiction, they're raping and murdering her
in a second jurisdiction, and they're dumping

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the remains in a third and they
went by names like that. US law

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enforcement has a huge town, I
was going to say, and they go

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by names like truck stop killer and
others. Yeah. Some of the most

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notorious serial killing truckers are featured in
the book, including Robert Ben Rhodes,

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who was good for probably fifty fifty
murder victims. He was stopped only because

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an Arizona State troopers saw his truck
along the side of the road, walked

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up to it, began to hear
a woman screaming. Turns out she was

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shackled to a torch and a torture
chamber rigged in the back of the truck,

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and that began the unraveling of Robert
Ben Rhodes. But I'm telling you

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there's many, many more out there, and Oklahoma has just suffered immeasurably with

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young women missing and murdered at the
hands of truckers. Thank goodness for Terry

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Turner. I feature one victim in
the book who is Casey Joe Pipe stem

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from the Seminole Nation of Oklahoma,
very young girl who was trafficked and then

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found dead in Grapevine, Texas.
Wow. Yeah, So when did this

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all begin? Well, I think
as long as there have been truckers and

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sex trafficking. We've had this ready
made kind of victim pool with a ready

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made suspect pool. But the FBI
started this initiative in two thousand and four

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and only publicly acknowledged it in two
thousand and nine because they had to.

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There are two men murders, and
by the way, this hasn't stopped.

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When you've got two hundred unsolved cases
and four hundred and fifty suspects, that

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means we still have serial killers amongst
the long haul community on our highways.

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Thank god. By the way,
we're only talking about a tiny fraction of

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long haul truckers because ninety nine percent
of them are decent, hard working people

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just trying to put food on their
family's table. I didn't want to indict

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the entire industry either, Frank Iglusy, because so many listen to this program,

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both on the terrestrial signal end on
our iHeart radio app when they're out

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of town. They like to keep
up with what's going on at home,

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and it makes them feel a little
more connected than they always There's that other

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thing too, the psychology of being
a long haul trucker. You're always disconnected.

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I do get deep into that.
I ask the question nature or nurture?

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These are these killers attracted to the
job, is what it allows them

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to do? When does it start? And of course the age old question

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of how do you make a serial
killer? Often these truckers have severe abuse

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in their childhood, but then the
light bulb goes on when they get into

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that isolated world of trucking that they
pretty much can do whatever they want without

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getting caught at it. So that
is the problem. It's been going on

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for decades and we need to bring
an into it. It's shifted a lot.

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I get into that the times of
trafficking that go on today are not

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so much physically at the truck stop
parking lot, but now online advertising.

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The transaction occurs at a nearby motel
or massage parlor. That makes it even

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harder and more dangerous for the victims. I was also going to ask about

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I mean, there was a time
when a lot of the truckers were abusing

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drugs to keep going and to log
more time. I don't know that that's

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so much of a problem, but
does that factor into the whole criminal aspect

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of this. Yeah. I asked
some of the women that I spoke with

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the victims who survived violent encounters with
truckers, and they said, without a

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doubt that alcohol and drugs does fuel
the violent rage sometimes that they encounter with

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a trucker. But I'm pleased to
report that some of the drug use has

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gone down. There was a period, you're right, seventies eighties, lots

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of amphetamine used to stay awake,
even meth, and then to come down.

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You know, you take downers,
you drink alcohol. The statistics right

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now are that ten percent of long
haul truckers drink alcohol every day, twenty

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percent binge drink five or more drinks
at a time, and forty four percent

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of truckers say they are suffering signs
of major depression. Oh, I can

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see that easily. I've had friends
who really weren't I think suitable for the

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job, and they were attracted to
the amount of money they were going to

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be making. And then I realized, well, what good is all this

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money if you're never home to spend
any of it? You know, you

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know, speaking of the money,
the guy I rode with, he's in

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the six figures. I mean he
left was a He was a graduate of

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the Culinary Institute of America. He
worked as a chef, but he left

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that job to make more money in
long haul truck. Yeah, it's a

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very especially now. The other thing
I wanted to ask about is the new

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technological advances that the trucking industry has
adopted, for instance, transponders. It's

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very difficult for a trucker these days
to stop for a long period of time

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without his dispatch. You're noticing technology
has played a role, and law enforcement

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does believe some of the numbers of
killing are going down because of the constant

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electronic monitoring that goes on. This
is particularly true at the big corporations.

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Right, the names were all familiar
with we see them emblazoned on the trail.

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But let me tell you something.
As I worked through that theory in

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the book, Hey, maybe probably
not a corporate trucker very tracked. Maybe

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it's owner operators. Well, then
I find chases where the corporate trucker has

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parked his rig on his mandatory thirty
six hours of downtime. So he gets

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in an uber or a rental car
and he goes out and kills on his

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downtime. So you can track it
all you want, but it's sitting at

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the parking lot. Yeah, former
FBI special agent Frank fig Lucy. The

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book is long haul Hunting the Highway
serial Killers has a lot to do with

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here in Oklahoma, as a lot
of this story was born here, so

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that is a fascinating part of the
read. Frank, I got to tell

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you too. The Matthews office building
used to reside in the same building as

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our local FBI headquarters. In fact, we would keep our radio station vehicles

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in the former FBI motor pool downstairs. So we're no longer in that building,

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but it was great fun to think
of all the lore of everything that

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had happened in that particular office.
Oh for sure. Yeah, there's a

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that's a great office. I've actually
been there a couple of times and I

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do occasional work for the Oklahoma City
Bombing Memorial and Foundation. Great people in

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that Thanks for listening to Later with
Lee Matthews the Lee Matthews Podcast, and

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remember to listen to The Drive Live
weekday afternoons from five to seven and iHeartMedia Presentation